This invention deals with an apparatus that is useful for handling small segments of wire that is to be welded. Coiled wire is commercially packed, shipped and stored in a coiled configuration, most of the time using a storage container. However, this packed commercial wire is usually packed in large quantities, that is, many hundreds of feet which cannot be carried by any workman.
There exists equipment that is useful for handling large quantities of stored wire when used in a welding apparatus. Such equipment can be found in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/931,007, filed Jan. 21, 2011 in the name of Thomas W. Burns, the inventor in this patent application.
What is disclosed and claimed herein is a small device that allows one to carry a small quantity of wire along with the equipment to feed the wire into a welding apparatus. In use for welding, where the wire is fed to a welding gun, the wire enters the gun through the rear of the gun and is subjected to electrical energy wherein it melts and is placed into channels in the metal to be welded to form a weld bead. Even with small quantities of wire, if not controlled, the wire, upon leaving the tip of the welding gun, and before it is melted, typically bends in any given direction and does not lay into the channel to form the bead. Thus, one is forced to use very short segments of wire (which do not retain the cast of the coiled wire), or the wire is short enough that it can be hand bent to get rid of the wire cast and provide a straight piece of wire.
Even in longer segments, the wire, if not controlled; tends to re-coil, that is, attempts to resume its original cast, or bends out of linearity and causes disruptions in the equipment, which causes a disruption of the welding process and a possible shutdown of the equipment for repair. It also provides snarled and bent wire which is useless for re-use and is costly to replace.
Thus, what is disclosed and claimed herein is a wire handling facilitator in the form of a backpack. The wire handling facilitator comprises a housing having a front, a back, and a central wrap around side wall joining the back. The front is a hinged door.
Located and supported within the housing is a spool. The spool has a centered first axle having a distal end and a near end. The first axle is supported at the distal end by attachment to an inside back wall surface. The near end has detachedly attached to it, a spool retainer.
There is an alignment wheel mounted on a second axle, wherein a distal end of the second axle is fixedly attached to the inside back wall surface. There is a brake pedal having a near end and a distal end wherein the near end has a first opening in it. The brake pedal is mounted on the second axle through the first opening, there being a secqnd opening near the near end of the brake pedal. The second opening has a near end of a tension spring detachedly attached to it, wherein the opposite end of the tension spring is detachedly attached to the wire handling facilitator housing nearby.
The alignment wheel is aligned to receive a wire from the spool in an outer groove of the alignment wheel. There is a wire drive puller and driver (drive rollers, drive wheels). The wire drive puller and driver is comprised of a housing having a front wall and a back wall.
There is a first opening in the front wall and a second opening in the back wall, each of the first opening and the second opening has a guide bushing inserted in it. There is a set of two drive rollers each having a centered axle, and an outside circumference, the set of drive rollers being vertically aligned with the alignment wheel and the drive rollers are vertically aligned with each other. The drive rollers are in close proximity to each other at the respective outside circumferences. There is a means of controlling the drive roller tensions.
There is a set of two idler rollers each having a centered axle and an outside circumference wherein the set of idler rollers is aligned with the alignment wheel and vertically aligned with each other. The idler rollers are in close proximity to each other at the outside circumferences. There is a means of controlling the speed of rotation of the drive rollers along with a drive motor attached to the drive rollers for powering and driving the drive rollers.